Over the past three years I've admittedly been a bit bitter because my favourite race / also my PB course, TYS10K had been axed while the Sporting Life 10K continued. Somewhere along the line I'd heard that the race was too crowded, not attended by elites and very focused on the charitable aspect. I'm not against charitable races, but I try to limit my participation so I am not constantly asking my friends and family for donations. Last fall I bit the bullet and decided to give the race a try.

With my injury, the last time I ran a 10K or more was January 14th, four months earlier. Last week I did the Mississauga 10K, but I'd run 3K straight and finished out the race with walk breaks. My hope of a PB was definitely long gone, so I went into the race hoping to at least be able to run pain free and to try to remind myself to be happy that I was running again.

On race day I was repeatedly surprised.

I managed to run the entire race (with the exception of hug breaks) and had almost identical 5K splits. Every kilometer was a full minute faster than anything I’ve run since January. I was incredibly pleased about this. Even better, I was pain free for the race.

The organization of the race was incredible. There were volunteers everywhere and despite the incredible numbers of runners and walkers (I've never looked back to see that many runners as in the photo below!) I always had a good buffer of space around me. I managed to see friends at the start, along the route and finish.

So, yes, I really liked this race! Of course it felt a bit more like a comeback race than last week, and although I mentioned in a previous post that I doubted I would be focused on goals and PBs in the future, it would be neat to see how I could do on this course had I not have been just coming back from injury!